The Price of Freedom – Post 9/11
Posted by Michael D Davis on September 11, 2010
Helen Keller said, “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.” We might take a moment and ask ourselves what this means not just to us personally but for our workplace, church, synagogue, mosque, neighborhood, town, state and country as we solemnly remember those lost on this day nine years ago.
(I posted this on my Facebook page this morning)
Nearly a decade has gone by since the tragedy this country will forever remember as 9/11 took place in downtown Manhattan. Yet, the pain and suffering of that day remains an open wound in the collective consciousness of this country as we struggle with the consequences.
One might ask “what is the price of freedom?” Is it a plane full of innocent travelers forced to overcome their fear and fight back to save even more lives if they do not? Is it a man in charge of security who continually reenters a burning tower to make sure that the employees in his company are all safe and accounted for only to perish in the collapse of the building? Is it the numerous acts of selfless heroism that take place every day so that others may live on? Yes, this is most certainly the price of freedom.
The price of freedom is more than these acts of brave men and women who lost their lives placing themselves in harm’s way putting someone else’s well being in front of their own. This is what we dwell upon. It is what we choose to see and accept as being the price of freedom.
There is another price for freedom. It’s one that has received much discussion yet isn’t necessarily associated with being free. With each trip we take by air we are under ever increasing scrutiny as our bags and persons are searched to the point of frustration. Applying for a job or a driver’s license or a bank account is more difficult and requires more paperwork to ensure that we are who we say we are. Our conversations by phone are intercepted as is our email to friends, family and associates, scrutinized for any sign of a link to terror. Some of us are placed on watch lists without our knowledge with no apparent reason as to why. Yes, this too is most certainly the price of freedom.
Another price of freedom is the right of a community to come together to build a private center of Islamic education and worship mere blocks away from what we now call “ground zero” in Manhattan, the scar marking the location of the towers brought down on September 11th, 2001. This same freedom extends to a Christian preacher in Florida who has vowed to turn this solemn day into a show of American solidarity by burning copies of the book of Koran in protest of the desire to build that same Islamic center near ground zero. This is the side of freedom that makes us angry and divides us as a people of diverse beliefs and understanding.
Freedom is all these things. We cannot effectively separate one from the others without taking away the freedom we have as inalienable rights. As Helen Keller so poignantly stated, “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet…”Let’s pray that our souls shall continue to be strengthened, our ambition inspired and success achieved through our tolerance and understanding that freedom isn’t always so free.
